Islamabad : Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday reacted sharply to his predecessor Imran Khan’s controversial comments about breaking Pakistan into three pieces and said the former premier was unfit for any public office after his latest utterances. Khan in an interview with Bol News on Wednesday talked, among other things, about possible breakup of the country if the right decisions were not made. Shehbaz Sharif, who is on an official visit to Turkey, taking strong exception to the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief’s choice of language in the interview, especially those about breaking up the country, accusing him of making naked threats against the country, and warned him against “talking about [the] division of Pakistan. While I am in Turkey inking agreements, Imran Niazi is making naked threats against the country. If at all any proof was needed that Niazi is unfit for public office, his latest interview suffices, the prime minister tweeted.
Do your politics but don’t dare to cross limits and talk about division of Pakistan, he added. According to Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper, the former prime minister admitted in the interview that he did not enjoy absolute power as the prime minister, indicating that the actual centres of power in the country lied elsewhere and that everyone knows where that is. Khan, who came to power in 2018, reportedly with the backing of the military, is the only Pakistani prime minister to be ousted in a no-confidence vote in Parliament. He was replaced by PML-N’s Shehbaz Sharif. The Pakistan Army, which has ruled the coup-prone country for more than half of its 73 plus years of existence, has hitherto wielded considerable power in the matters of security and foreign policy. However, the army has continuously denied its involvement in politics.